


“People disappear all the time”, a Cassandra one-shot

by AzureAngel2



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-08
Updated: 2021-01-08
Packaged: 2021-03-12 16:08:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28638288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AzureAngel2/pseuds/AzureAngel2
Summary: Summary: In a vast galaxy it is easy to let a single individual disappear without a trace. In principle.Time frame: The story takes place in 0 BBY, some weeks after the destruction of the First Death Star.Places of choice: first Coruscant and then MustafarLength: one-shotFurther reader warning: Please excuse my weird English! I am German. English is only my Second language!Disclaimer: SW is owned by George Lucas, Lucas Ltd. and now The Walt Disney Company
Kudos: 1





	“People disappear all the time”, a Cassandra one-shot

_Sing me a song of a lass that is gone_  
_Say, could that lass be I?_  
_Merry of soul she sailed on a day_  
_Over the sea to Skye_

_Billow and breeze, islands and seas_  
_Mountains of rain and sun_  
_All that was good, all that was fair_  
_All that was me is gone_

_Sing me a song of a lass that is gone_  
_Say, could that lass be I?_  
_Merry of soul she sailed on a day_  
_Over the sea to Skye_

** The Verity District, Coruscant, one day after the Battle of Yavin: **

Secret prisons operated under a separate standard from traditional ones. Not only were their prisoners denied access to communications or deprived of their due process rights. Most of all they were hidden from public scrutiny and the eyes of civil rights.

When the Galactic Empire had taken over from the Republic, just the names of those places had changed. The locations and, in some cases, even the staff, had remained.

Sinjir Rath Velus was not a regular custodian around here. Just a mere visitor with some serious business in this facility. Not for Sid Uddra, his mentor. This time somebody much higher on top of the circus had asked a favour of him. Hoping for a promotion within the ISB ranks, he had agreed.

But then the mess about Yavin had happened. And with the explosion of the Death Star his employer had ceased to exist.

First, the Imperial loyalty officer had not been sure how to continue. Then, he had made a private decision. To continue his top-secret mission anyway. It was more than a question of military honour. He wanted to break his asset. The entire thing had become pretty personal.

For the last half an hour, Sinjir Rath Velus was off duty. Which meant leisure time for him. With his boots up and a good drop. He had already pealed out of his white uniform jacket, but wore his trousers still.

With a cackle, he pulled himself a generous glass of Corellian whiskey.

Nobody of great consequence would come asking for the girl. She was dead to the universe.

Even her fiancé, Zevulon Veers, would believe the evidence of her passing when presented. COMPNOR did not enlist the brightest torches.

“I will teach you a lesson or two, little Miss Snotty Nose!”

Mockingly, he raised his glass to the air in front of him.

Her pride was unduly. She was not even a real officer’s daughter. Her old man had been an architect and scientist in the field of weapons development.

The door chimed and while it opened an unannounced visitor broke into his private quarters.

It was an elderly man in civilian clothing with the most ugliest visage ever. A long time ago an explosion seemed have gone off in that face.

“Hey!” grunted Sinjir Rath Velus and surged to his feet.

“Erv Lekauf,” the stranger introduced himself.

That name rang no bell whatsoever.

The man’s gaze dwelled on him with unnerving calmness. “I am here on Lord Vader’s behalf.”

Fury was not the right word to describe what the loyalty officer felt after the name dropping. His throat felt tight. “You were send by whom?”

His grotesque facial disfigurement did clearly not grant the stranger very dynamic facial expressions. “You are wasting his time. Which is always dangerous and unwise if you ask me. And I gained ample experience in His Lordship’s service.”

There was a lot to say about this indirect threat. But then again, Lord Vader was known to be unpredictable. To let his henchman wait was not the wisest thing to do. It could indeed reflect badly on him.

“Grand Moff Tarkin perished in battle against the rebels,” Erv Lekauf moved on. “Which means you need to transfer your prisoner immediately to Mustafar. Believe me you do not need... this type of filth... on your watch!”

That was true, but Sinjir Rath Velus still had doubts about releasing his prisoner into somebody else’s custody. During the past days he had actually gotten very found of the resourceful girl, who was barely out of her teens. They had not explored her breaking point yet.

Erv Lekauf lowered his voice to an absolute minimum. “People disappear all the time.” There was a well-placed pause, before he said much louder, “And I have come to understand that the only child of Director Krennic has already perished in an explosion.”

The Imperial loyalty officer, not able to suppress a grin, nodded. At least they agreed on that. “Cassandra was known to be a horrible cook. When she tried to heat up some junk food, the family nano-wave blew her into pieces.”

At that the elderly man frowned. “It sounds more like rebel activities, if you ask me. Saw Gerrera, perhaps? Krennic and him had history.”

With a smirk, Sinjir Rath Velus announced, “Rather confident sources of mine found out that this lunatic died on Jedha.”

“How convenient! Another explosion. And all traces gone.”

The loyal officer begged to differ. “It seems that Galen Erso’s daughter tried to get in contact with Krennic directly after that incident. She came all the way to Scarif to see him. And he let her enter the shield. With his personal security code.”

Erv Lekauf looked sceptical. “Even if Krennic did that, let me ask why should the girl want to seek out the man who killed her mother?”

“Lyra Erso? I bet that woman is still alive and well, tucked away safely somewhere else.”

The elderly man shook his head. “You believe that Death Troopers willingly falsify an official report.”

“Because they followed Krennic. They all were loyal only to him. And not to the Empire any more.” Sinjir Rath Velus grew overexcited, while explaining his theories. Finally, he had an audience for them. “See, it was all a trap from the very beginning. Krennic and Erso sabotaged the entire project together.”

For a moment he thought that Erv Lekauf would throttle him. Then the elderly man just said drily, “This is why Lord Vader send me. To retrieve the truth from Miss Krennic personally.”

“It’s up to the people what they believe or do not believe.” The Imperial loyalty officer shrugged. “There is always fake news on the HoloNet. Like the one about Senator Leia Organa.”

“To which one do you refer to? Because there are so many rumours out there since the Battle above Yavin.”

“The one that says she was on a diplomatic mission, when she encountered an unexpected meteorite field she could not avoid, and had gone down with all hands on board,” Sinjir Rath Velus replied. “Your boss invented that one, right? When he got hold on her above Tatooine.”

The elderly man did not waver. Instead, his distorted features formed another smile. “You know that I cannot possibly comment on that.”

“Yeah, sure,” the Imperial loyalty officer mumbled.

All of a sudden, there was an unexpected harshness in Erv Lekauf. “Are you finished with your speculations now, or should I ask one of the Inquisitors to assist you opening the cell door of Miss Krennic? Or do you wait for another exploding nano-wave to do the job for you?”

Vader’s castle on Mustafar, seven days after the Battle of Yavin:

Illiteracy for social reasons had been a common finding in many parts of the Galactic Republic. More than nineteen years of his master’s rein had made matters worse for many civilians. They were not be able to fill out their tax papers or read the HoloNet news tickers.

Darth Vader moved the text in question closer to his optical filters.

Normally, his anger and pain served him well. But, right now, it hindered his text comprehension. The only solution was to let go. To empty his mind and heart for the time reading.

His cicatrised brow furrowed.

It would indeed not be helpful to switch on his lightsaber. Especially not while being inside his mediation chamber with all its fragile technical equipment.

He mastered a strangled laugh that sounded like the cough of a hookah pipe smoker.

Scorched through control panels would not make him gain anything from the stolen Jedi scripts. Plus another room of his castle would be uninhabitable.

No, he had to do better than this. He was a dark lord of the Sith. Not an animal that just lived out its whims. He had to act with purpose. Cunning even.

The Aurebesh letters danced up and down in front of his eyes. Making him slightly dizzy. Not for long though. He fought hard to win the upper hand.

“Common to occur between Jedi Masters and their apprentices, a Force bond, also known as Force chain or Jedi kinship, was a link through which two Force-sensitives could influence each other.”

The first paragraph.

He had made it.

Pride kicked in.

He would always be a slow reader, true. There was no way of denying that. Yet, he had fought hard to achieve more. And it paid off.

The dark lord focused again.

“It allowed the communication of feelings, thoughts and images across distances and granted greater coordination in battle. Through such connections the Force easily flowed, sometimes allowing one’s will to bolster the strengths of the other, or possibly to draw upon their strengths.”

He pondered on what he just had read, but not for to long. Another paragraph waited.

“Force bonding was said to also be something that manifested itself in such techniques as Jedi Battle meditation, the ability to demoralize or inspire the minds of others, or in the practice of feeding upon the Force. It was rumoured that Revan studied Force Bonding deeply during his many apprenticeships before leaving for the Mandalorian Wars and, according to HK-47, he speculated that many Jedi did not fully form such connections because of their discipline, because they were forbidden to open their lives to the passions around them, and therefore few of them even realized the extent to which it was possible.”

His right handprosthesis formed a grim fist, but he refrained from smashing it down in front of him.

The Jedi High Council had kept such precious knowledge away from the rest of the galaxy. Including their own brethren. In the end the council members had deserved their untimely ends. Every single one of them.

He read on.

“Darth Nihilus supposedly took this practice to unmatched levels, able to touch all life on one planet, to form and consume connections with countless people at once.”

To stop now, would be a pity.

Besides, his guest of honour would still be asleep.

“Some wielders of the Force could use connections to communicate knowledge. For instance, such was the case with Darth Revan and the Rakta of Lehon, when he used the Force to rip the Rakata language from their mind and make them understand Basic so they could help him find the Star Forge. Also Bastila Shan used her own bond with Revan to draw out his lost memories and lead the Jedi to the Star Forge, though in doing so she was also affected by his dark taint.

Kreia often taught Meetra Surik across great distances, using Telepathy. Their bond allowed Surik to understand just as much as if her Master were before her. Surik herself, who was seemingly a very quick learner, really used her own bonding ability to feel what she wanted to learn in the person that held the knowledge. She did such a thing as the Jedi Masters she went in search of attempted to teach her forms of lightsaber combat and Force combat, amazing them with the speed at which she learned.”

Satisfied, Darth Vader leaned back in his seat. Inside his helmet he closed his eyes.

The possibilities of what he had just learned were endless. As endless as the joy that Cassandra Morrígain Krennic gave him.

Many years ago, she had crashed into his life like an asteroid. The imprint she left could not be denied. Nor the special bond between them.

****************************************************************

At dawn, the dark lord left his hyperbaric chamber. Not only did he feel refreshed, he was full of drive again.

His thoughts returned to a passage of the text, he had devoured earlier on.

“Force bonding refers to the innate Force ability to form connections in the Force. The degree to which that was possible varied depending on the Force-sensitivity of the people involved, meaning that the stronger they were in the Force, the stronger the connection would be. While most life had a marginal ability to form connections, some were said to have a special predisposition to it.”

His shiny black all-terrain combat boots clacked loudly through the corridors of his personal abode.

This place was even more austere than his palace on Coruscant. No riches or decorations. And certainly no display of his great wealth.

With his Sith inauguration he had gotten access to unimaginable riches. For which he really did not care. There were just means to an end.

The true treasure here was the girl, he had taken in.

In another life, when she had been Nagina, she used to have such Force a bond with her uncle, Sheev Palpatine.

By a strange twist of fate, her reincarnation was attached to his own soul. Being cousins, it was only logical that it would. The Jedi text had made that clear to him. Blood called blood.

****************************************************************

There was singing in somewhat obscene Huttese. It was a song that Darth Vader had heard some place before.

_“Lapti nek lapti nek_  
_Lapti nek lapti nek_  
_Lapti nek lapti nek_  
_Wow!”_

Cassandra shrieked those lines in utter delight, while bouncing up and down her mattress.

_Work it out work it out_  
_Work it out work it out_  
_Work it out work it out_  
_Wow!_

He drew a reasonable conclusion. “I presume you slept well.”

“The size of this bed!” she cheered, while the Alderaniaan relaxa-bed creaked forbiddingly. “An entire Jizz band would be able to preform a gig in it. Without bumping into one another at all!”

The dark lord stood emotionless while he watched his ward luxuriating in the rubin-coloured satin sheets.

“This is frecking gorgeous! You are the best! I forgot to tell you last night”

Her thanks was not necessary. He could have done far better, but fate had played against him.

During the Battle of Yavin a stupid Tie-fighter had come crashing into his own space craft. This had postponed his arrival on Coruscant in unbelievable ways. But finally he had found the young woman in an ISB prison cell. In the grasp of Sinjir Rath Velus. This particular lImperial oyalty officer was known for his ability to inflict as much pain as possible to suspects.

If Cassandra had suffered during her imprisonment, she was not willing to show him. He respected her bravery, her high spirits. But at some point he would introduce to his medical staff to her. He wanted to be on the safe side.

Suddenly, his ward stopped moving altogether. “Why the library?” she mused. “This is what you want to know, right?”

He turned his back to her. “This is one of my many questions, yes.”

Actually, there was an entire mountain of unanswered questions. One always lead to the next. But he would need to thread with care. The last time he had been late for a rescue, the person had died in his arms.

No, not his arms, he corrected himself immediately. It had been the arms of Anakin Skywalker, the fool.

Cassandra tiptoed towards him and he let her. “Bane would seek the wisdom of Masters long dead in leather-bound volumes.”

His little storyteller. Always trying to distract him.

Cordial, he folded his arms. Now that she was with him in this castle, safe and sound, there was no hurry any more. So, he would hear her out. “So why one of the most public places on Coruscant?”

“Normally, only book lovers go there,” was her lame excuse. “Plus, it used to be one of my places of power.”

Darth Vader lacked the right words.

“I should have taken a ship,” Cassandra muttered somewhere behind him.

“Where to?”

Her next answer was as cryptic as it was mind-blowing. “Lothal. There, there is a place among the stones. It’s fairly safe there.”

There was a lot to inquire there, but sooner or later she would tell him. In the end it did not matter. She was here with him now and would stay on.

“You should not venture these corridors freely, Cassandra,” he reminded her.

“I know, I know,” she pouted. “Otherwise I will share Vaneé’s fate, right?”

They had talked about the gas and it’s effect on mortal minds before. The breath of Mustafar’s soil was dangerous.

She tapped him lightly on his right shoulder blade, that was protected by his Sith armour. “Cousin?”

He suppressed a smile. “Yes, Cassandra?”

“I would prefer being in space with you during missions,” she admitted somewhat shyly.

He could not resist being sarcastic. “What makes you believe that I would allow you to have a happily ever after in complete idleness? Of course you have a bunk onboard my command ship.”

The young woman saluted immediately. “Sir, thanks for the chance, sir!”

If anybody deserved a chance it was her.

The Krennic assets were frozen, the family name was eradicated from all the projects her father had ever worked on. From now on, he would hide her in plain sight from his master. He saw no reason why this should not work.

“But there are certain precautions to be taken. You would need to change your outfit, your hair style and most of all, your name.”

She blinked in quick succession. “What?”

“Morrígain Kinnear.”

“Who?”

“That will be your name from now on.” He suppressed the urge to call her Cassandra this time. It was more difficult than he thought.

“But…”

He rose an impatient hand. “Now, we will both have a tour through the castle.”

She still looked like a fish on dry land and he was not even Force choking her. “I…”

Darth Vader made himself as imposing as possible. It hurt him a great deal to do so. Obi-Wan had ruined his health forever more. And the recent harsh treatment of his own master had made things worse. Some rebel pilot in an X-wing had blown up the Death Star and not him.

Dazed, Cassandra looked up to him. “I actually like my name.”

The Dark Lord saw exactly where she intended to go. “You have more of your father left then just your name.”

An ugly frown formed on her forehead, reminding him so much of the Emperor. “When you took your Sith moniker, did you also want to distance yourself from your mother?”

He had killed for less. But if this was a test for anger management, he was prepared to pass it with flying colours. Once upon a time, the Other had been a rebellious teenager, too. “My title was given to me by my master. I had no say in it.”

Pity showed in her face. “First the dreadful quality of the Sith armour he squeezed your human leftovers in and now that name!”

He concentrated on her hairline instead of her throat, which was too good to miss. “After all these years you have the nerve to complain about my name?”

Suddenly, she wrung her hands. “It’s just... cruel and not fair to you.”

That struck him as odd. “In how far?”

She would not meet his gaze. “Just sayin’.”

He took a laboured breath that really, really hurt. “Do not make me ask!”

Her chin jerked up. “In one of the Corellian languages, spoken by some fisher tribe, it… it means Dark Father.”

He started feeling odd.

“And you lost your wife and child during the Clone Wars,” she argued. “This is what I really hate about the Sith. The sheer cruelty. Your master is such a sadist! Rubbing it in like this!”

Right now, he felt like grabbing Cassandra and throwing her straight into the lava river underneath.

With the accuracy of a seer, this impossible always found the breakages of his mental armour. But better her than his master. Where Sheev Palpatine caused havoc, she tried to kiss his wounds.

“When you have finished with the inventory of my deficiencies, we could do the round tour,” Darth Vader found himself saying. “It would be unfortunate, when you end up with a permanent brain damage like Vaneé. Just because you get lost in a wrong corner of this fortress.”

When he opened the door, Cassandra suddenly trotted behind him in silent obedience. But it would not always be this way. They had to much in common. A wild, self-destructive streak.

**Author's Note:**

> Sources:  
> “The Skye Boat Song” for the TV series “Outlander” written by Bear McCreary  
> Wookieepedia – The Star Wars Wiki


End file.
